On the African Plain there is a Meta Predator and her name
is Leo. Panthera leo to be exact.
The internet is the greatest collection of wealth or fodder,
depending upon your info-perspective the world has ever
seen. With such a cacophony of directories filled with
video, text, imagery, sound, fury, Hot Flash and Cold
Fusion, what's an information cheetah to do in order to make
sense of it all and take it to another level of the Game?
Simple. Use the expertise of your fellow experts to reach
escape velocity. Take yourself to the Meta level with
something that is free, easy to use and will make your
search for mission critical information a cruise.
Deja News:
(http://deja.com/usenet). The archive of Usenet.
A Meta Expert takes advantage of other experts in the way
that a meta search engine takes advantage of smaller search
engines, the way that a lion takes advantage of smaller
predators such as the Cheetah.
No, I don't work for Deja, or have any affiliation with them
whatsoever. I'm simply the writer, athlete, producer,
graphic designer, videographer Company Computer Guy,
Marketer, PR man, CEO, CIO, CTO, chief dog walker and all
around Mass Media Information SuperStar at large of
dogtv.com networks (The SuperDog Station) http://dogtv.com
I'm a corporation of one and I know I'm not alone out there.
I became an expert on dogs via my own inherent brilliance,
passion and background in writing and biology, with a big
helping hand from Usenet (newsgroups). By reading posts
from experts across the country, I quickly discerned the
existence of, and in fact coined the phrases to describe
three major camps in the Dog Game:
A. Koehler Nazis (a choke chain is their best friend)
B. Control Freaks (a cage is their best friend)
C. Psychologists (Prozac is their only friend)
and I came out swinging with my own site, media, personality
and "DOG GAME" philosophy which treats dog training as a
game, the way dogs treat it and which views (correctly) dogs
as the athletes and hunters that they are, and not
"problems" to be fixed or solved with punishment, cages or
expensive drugs.
As a usenet pro, I quickly learned to spot experts in other
groups, including Digital Video, Computer Hardware,
Software, Web Developing, and everything else I needed to
learn YESTERDAY in order to create my own television
presence on almost no budget.
Newsgroups are communities anyone can join, where experts in
their fields, everything from motherboards for Athlon
Processors, Danish Gardening, Bicycle Mechanics and
questionable sexual habits get together to fight, laugh,
educate, commiserate and battle for the soul of the digital
demographic and deja.com is the Grand Central Station of
information.
A newbie who needs info will go to a search engine. I even
cut my teeth working at a very successful search engine
site, 4anything.com (http://4anything.com). These sights
are great, especially for newbies. But what about experts?
An expert who needs critical info (Which anti virus program
won't take over my computer and be worse than an actual
infection? Will this video card be compatible with my
motherboard? Linux or Windows 2000 Professional, please
help?) might do is to bypass the hit and mostly miss search
engines and go directly to the newsgroups, and ask their
question and hold their breath waiting for an answer (which
might take minutes or days, depending on whether the busy
experts feel like answering it).
But here's what a "Meta" Expert would do. He/She would go
to deja.com, click on the usenet link and type their query,
such as the name of their video card and the name of their
motherboard, and chances are (very good, actually) that some
other desperate soulwho has suffered a thousand crashes
and cursed a thousand Gateshas already asked the same
question, and several "experts" have already come to their
aid with relevant answers. All you have to do is find a
thread which looks good, click on the "view thread" link and
bingo, you've struck an information mother lode where you
can peruse a whole thread (crosslinked history of a
discussion), filled with tips from stone cold experts in
that particular field. People who LIVE for motherboards.
Believe me, they're out there.
You're at the top of the Food Chain now, Baby!
Two years ago, I was afraid to open up my computer and
install an internal Zip Drive. Now, I'm a bios flashing,
hard drive partitioning, motherboard overclocking hoodlum
with three entirely home built, networked systems, strapped
with 200 gigabytes of storage space, processing and pumping
out dogumentary dogudrama video for the masses.
Broadcast.com, eat my shorts. I take that back, maybe we
can be partners some day? C'mon, gimmie a break here, I'm
just trying to sell an article? Go Mavs!
Now I even have Hollywood sites like LOADTV
(http://loadtv.com) contacting me, thinking I'm a big
company, asking me to provide content for them.
I couldn't have become such an info SuperStar alone. Sure,
being talented and born for it helps, but I still could not
have done it without the help of experts around the world,
at my beck and call, free for the consulting, 24 hrs. a day,
on Deja News. Instead of sifting through the infoglut, rise
above it and study the people at the precipice of the
edifice, yes those who have already been there, done that,
and distilled it for you. The Experts.
About the Author
Michael Patton
Dog Game SuperStar
All Purpose Phenom, who has been published in the
Philadelphia Inquirer and several other publications with
articles on sport, science, satire, biotechnology, dogs and
more.
http://dogtv.com